


For Summer Days; A Nightmare

by Cherith



Category: Richard III - Shakespeare
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-17
Updated: 2010-09-17
Packaged: 2017-10-11 22:34:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/117841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cherith/pseuds/Cherith
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clarence's dream haunts him, and he thinks on things to distract himself as he waits for some news of his rescue.  He thinks on summer days at Ludlow to drown out the shadows and moaning of his nightmare.</p>
            </blockquote>





	For Summer Days; A Nightmare

**Author's Note:**

  * For [the_alchemist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_alchemist/gifts).



> Request: 1) The York family (i.e. the Duke and Duchess, Edward, Clarence, Richard and Rutland). Summer holidays. 2) Richard III. Anything at all.  
> Written for the_alchemist for [thisengland](http://www.livejournal.com/community/thisengland) ficathon. I have a soft spot for crazy dreams and wanted to include two of the requests, and this was the best way I could think to do them. Hope you like it!

  
**For Summer Days; A Nightmare**   


The dream continued to haunt him. To be honest, there was not much else to keep him occupied in the tower. He prayed and when he had the chance, he struck up the occasional conversation with the guard and most days, that was enough. He had woken up this morning feeling worse than he had his whole stay here in the tower and it was all to do with that damned dream.

He told the guard about it this morning and after, he was sure that would be the end of it. He was never one to put much stock in these things. Indeed for a short while after relaying his terrible dream, he did feel better, like a weight had been lifted. But, as the day wore on, small things...memories kept creeping back into his mind. He thought about how happy he had been when his brother had come to relieve him of tower life.

And, he had been happy in the beginning. His brother had a boat arranged and waiting for them; one bound for Burgundy. There, he would be able to wait out Edward's suspicion in a more peaceable manner. They escaped the tower easily, in the way that happens in dreams where the scene shifts so easily from place to place . There were goods and belongings already on board the ship when the arrived and as the ship set for sea, George had taken to his cabin.

"Come for a walk with my brother, Clarence," Richard had said some time later, undetermined by the dream.

Richard led the way from George's cabin; his shoes shuffling against the ship's floor boards as they moved slowly towards the deck. George had been frightened they may have been followed from the tower and onto the boat. He followed his brother's swaying gait with some caution but Richard had allayed his fears, explaining that he only wished to talk.

They roamed the hatches for what seemed like days, watching the ocean sway and fall, each time catching shadowed glimpses of home. Each time they laid eyes on England's shores, or a line of castles and mansions in the far distance, George felt a pain in his heart. Thinking about it now, he knew it was only the dream that put those things in his sight. No home was so near a shoreline, only the dream shores could be so populated. Even so he thought, any day was too long to be locked away from such a home, tenuous a battlefield though it might be.

Richard reminded him of happier days: of those summer months at Ludlow where they met Edward and Edmund for the first time. What happy children they had been: they played in the field, were excited to watch their brothers practice at swordplay, tormented Margaret with their boyish antics all while York loyalists gathered nearby. They had felt more like a family then, a family that prayed and rejoiced together, even as the men strategized for what might come in the fall.

"Do you remember how pleasant those days were Richard?" He'd asked as they tarried near the ship's rail as if to see those shadowed memories play again in their vision. "Even with Henry's armies advancing on Ludlow, we were happy."

"We were excited to see battle," Richard answered. "We hoped to be strong men like father, Edmund and Edward..." the sound of his voice is hidden away by the crushing force of a wave against the ship's hull.

Then, the unthinkable happened when his brother: poor hunched brother Gloucester started to tumble as the ship rocked forward. He had thought to reach for him, to help Richard catch his footing again, only...George had been knocked overboard in the process. His brother thankfully had gained his own purchase and did not follow him in to the inky waters of the sea but he only had a moment to think on it, before he could not think at all.

The dream haunted him. He felt continually surrounded by the icy, dark waters in which his dream self slept. Sunlight streamed through his lonely tower window and yet it would not be enough to wipe the shadowed figure of his brother who remained on the ship even as he drowned. His brother who did not reach for him as he fell nor did he yell for help, only watched as George slipped further and further into the darkness.

Only for so many happy days would he want to dream that again but when he closed his eyes it was there waiting for him. His meals tasted of cold and salty water and his body fatigued with the effort to stay afloat even as he sat in his chamber and awaited any news from his family. Only for those boyhood days, where he and Richard ran circles around Margaret as young brothers are wont to do. For the sunny afternoons Edward took he and Richard out the field and let them each in turn practice with his sword. When Edmund took them out on horseback around the house at Ludlow.

George tried to hold those thoughts in his mind as he fell asleep that night. Not the ghosts that haunted him, not the deeds he had done (all in the name of family), but those days that might keep him at peace at night, in his elder age -- should he some day reach it. Eventually he did sleep, the shapes of houses and family and the deep cold despair all swirling together in his mind. And he thought...he heard voices; talk of a warrant.

"Only the half-crazed screams of the dead, ghosts and spirits come for me," he whispered to the walls. "I have done what I've done and must await what will come for me." He covered his ears with his hands, and murmured to himself to drown out the accusations and reminders of ghosts, angels and devils.

Richard would come to his aid. Richard would save him, just like he had in the dream. He would be returned home soon enough. He sighed, kept closed his eyes and ears...and waited.


End file.
